I would like to mention that I took djfourmoney's recommendation and looked into donating plasma for cash. I discovered that my state and it's two bordering states do not pay people when they donate plasma (or anything). It was worth a look into and I would have done it if was found to be healthy enough to donate and I lived in a state that paid people to donate.

I thought I'd share a link that will inform people whether a specific blood bank in their state will pay a donor or not.

I thought I would give two examples of a blood bank in a southern state. One example doesn't pay donors and one example does. The examples are to point out the icons next to their names. The icons indicate whether they compensate donors in cash or not.

http://bloodbanker.com/banks/bloodbank. ... er&ID=1996
Notice the red drop symbol next to that blood center's name. The symbol of the red circle with a white drop means no cash compensation for the donors. Mousing over the icon it says "This center does NOT pay you money. It pays you in feeling good about helping people."